Yeah, that's right; I've got five pages. Fortunately for me, in the case of first drafts the number of pages marks progress despite the quality of the actual writing on those pages. In terms of quality, I'm not really sure what the quantitative measure of my work would be, but it's most likely some decimal with a zero point something or other.
Like 0.34 pages. That's just a guess.
But at this stage, words are words are words and their mere existence on my computer screen means progress. It's crucial at this point to completely ignore the debilitating feeling that everything you write is utter crap; how it's so bad you're not even sure you'll be able to fix it in subsequent rewrites, or how maybe no amount of work will ever be sufficient to turn the pile of steaming garbage that is your imagination into an actual story that makes any earthly sense at all. Let alone make it entertaining. And funny. And smart.
Better to just give up now.
Ignore that. Head down, full steam ahead, words are words are words. Keep them coming. Keep writing and don't turn back, not to fix your grammar, not to edit your dialogue - seriously, just write it and move on to the next thing. Waiting for genius means you'll never think of anything. You'll never write anything. Get something down on paper (on screen, whatever) and later, when it's actually there, you can pick it apart. Not before. Later. Don't just assume what you're about to write is going to be crap. Write it, then when you see how awful it is you can get to fixing it.
To sum up: Yes, you're first draft is going to suck. Congratulations; sucking is the first step to not sucking.
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